Panzer Army Africa

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Panzergruppe Afrika
Panzerarmee Afrika
German-Italian Panzer Army

active September 1, 1941 to February 22, 1943
Country German Reich NSGerman Reich (Nazi era) German Empire
Armed forces Wehrmacht
Armed forces army
Type army
Second World War Africa campaign
Operation Crusader
Company Theseus
first battle of El Alamein
Battle of Alam Halfa
second battle of El Alamein
Operation Torch
Tunisian campaign
Battle of the Kasserin Pass
Supreme command
list of Commander in chief

The Panzer Army Africa / Panzer Army High Command Africa (PzAOK Africa) was a major unit of the Army of the Wehrmacht during the Second World War . It was the high command of changing army corps as well as numerous special troops and was set up on September 1, 1941 as Panzergruppe Afrika in North Africa by the union of the Italian units with the Africa Corps and other German units. On January 30, 1942, the name was changed to Panzerarmee Afrika, during the second battle of El Alamein there was another name change to German-Italian Panzer Army in October 1942. The army fought against the British 8th Army on the North African theater of war . After initial success, the Axis forces finally lost initiative after the defeat in the Battle of Alam Halfa .

history

On September 1, 1941, the German Africa Corps was combined with other units to form the Africa Panzer Group , which was placed under the command of Erwin Rommel , with Ludwig Crüwell taking over the Africa Corps as commanding general. After the Afrikakorps had advanced from the positions in Libya on Rommel's unauthorized initiative to Tobruk , the advance of the German troops halted in front of Tobruk and Sollum, where Allied troops had built fortifications from minefields, anti-tank trenches and anti-tank nests.

Shot down German Panzer IV, right British Crusader (November 27, 1941)

The cities were besieged by the German units without success until November 1941 when a British counter-offensive under the code name Operation Crusader was launched , through which the trapped troops were to be horrified. At the beginning of this operation, the first British counterattacks failed with high losses due to the resistance of the Panzer Army Africa, but Allied forces launched another attack on November 18, 1941. As a result of this thrust, allied formations trapped inside were able to break out of the grip of the tank army, which, as a result of the counter-offensive, withdrew to its starting position on western Cyrenaica .

In January 1942, the renamed Panzer Army Africa was able to regain the initiative in the African theater of war again through air raids by Luftflotte 2 under Albert Kesselring on hubs of British supplies such as Malta . The tank army was strengthened again by refreshments and the supply of new personnel and material and on May 26, 1942, the company Theseus started to conquer the port city of Tobruk. After long fighting, the army was finally able to occupy the city. As a result of this victory, the commander-in-chief of the tank army, Erwin Rommel, was promoted to field marshal . German troops advanced as far as El Alamein , which was 100 kilometers west of Alexandria . There the first battle of El Alamein between the British 8th Army and the German-Italian units took place in July 1942 . The battle ended in a strategic stalemate, with the German advance being halted. Decisive for this were the severe supply problems on the part of the Axis powers.

At the end of August 1942, the tank army started the last non-allied offensive in Egypt after a temporary improvement in the supply situation in the battle of Alam Halfa . This lasted until September 6, 1942 and ultimately failed due to the strong British defense and material and air superiority.

After a long planning phase, the 8th Army, under the command of Lieutenant General Bernard Montgomery, launched a major offensive against the tank army on October 23, 1942 , in which 195,000 Commonwealth troops faced 60,000 German-Italian soldiers. As a result of this offensive, due to Hitler's strict order to halt, the Ariete armored division was destroyed and Rommel finally ordered the nightly retreat of the forces into the Fuka area without waiting for the dictator's approval. On October 25, the tank army was renamed the German-Italian Panzer Army ( Armata Corazzata Italo-Tedesca ) in accordance with an agreement between the Wehrmacht High Command and the Comando Supremo, in order to make the common fate of the allies clear to the outside world. On November 8, 1942, British-American units landed in the Vichy-French colonies in North Africa under the code name Operation Torch . Due to the new war on two fronts, the troops of the tank army had to give up Tobruk on November 13, 1942 and Libya at the end of January 1943.

The army finally withdrew to Tunisia, where on February 23, 1943, the High Command of Army Group Africa was formed, to which the German 5th Panzer Army in the north-west and the Italian 1st Army, which had been newly established with the previous associations of the German-Italian Panzer Army under Giovanni Messe on the Mareth Line .

structure

September 20, 1941

September 1942

November 1942

German Africa Corps (Lieutenant General Wilhelm Ritter von Thoma )

XX. Italian Army Corps (motorized) (Lieutenant General Giuseppe de Stephanis)

Xth Italian Army Corps (Lieutenant General Edoardo Nebba)

XXI. Italian Army Corps (Lieutenant General Enea Navarini)

February 1943

Commander in Chief of the Army

Rank Surname date
General of the Panzer Force / Colonel General Erwin Rommel September 1, 1941 to March 9, 1942
General of the armored force Ludwig Crüwell March 9 to March 19, 1942 (mdFb)
Colonel General / Field Marshal General Erwin Rommel March 19 to September 22, 1942
General of the armored force Georg Stumme September 22 to October 24, 1942 (mdFb)
Lieutenant General Wilhelm Ritter von Thoma October 24 to October 25, 1942 (mdstvFb)
Field Marshal General Erwin Rommel October 25 to November 26, 1942
General of the armored force Gustav Fehn November 26th to December 2nd, 1942 (mdstvFb)
Field Marshal General Erwin Rommel December 2, 1942 to February 22, 1943

literature

  • Reinhard Stumpf : The war in the Mediterranean region 1942/43 - The operations in North Africa and in the central Mediterranean . In: The German Reich and the Second World War . Volume 6. Ed. Military History Research Office , Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, Stuttgart 1990, ISBN 3-421-06233-1 , pp. 569-757.
  • Major General Ian Stanley Ord Playfair: The Mediterranean and the Middle East. Volume IV: The Destruction of the Axis Forces in Africa ( History of the Second World War , United Kingdom Military Series), Her Majesty's Stationary Office, 1996, ISBN 1-84574-068-8 .
  • Ian Stanley Ord Playfair: The Mediterranian and the Middle East. Volume III, September 1941 - September 1942: British Fortune reaches their Lowest Ebb. , Her Majesty's Stationary Office, London 1960.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Reinhard Stumpf: The War in the Mediterranean 1942/43 - The operations in North Africa and in the central Mediterranean . In: The German Reich and the Second World War . Volume 6. Ed. Military History Research Office , Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, Stuttgart 1990, ISBN 3-421-06233-1 , p. 698.
  2. ↑ Reinhard Stumpf: The War in the Mediterranean 1942/43 - The operations in North Africa and in the central Mediterranean . In: The German Reich and the Second World War . Volume 6. Ed. Military History Research Office , Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, Stuttgart 1990, ISBN 3-421-06233-1 , p. 701.